When the Collegiate Readership Program was abruptly canceled this past September, Georgetown lost a valuable program. It was therefore heartening to see the newspapers return a few weeks ago, filling the dispenser in front of the ICC and stocking racks in Leavey and Lauinger. The readership program also returned with some much-needed reforms that will help lower the program’s cost and ensure that more undergraduates have access to the papers. At an initial cost of $6,500 per semester, the price tag for the initiative is large, but it is easily one of the wisest purchases the Georgetown University Student Association has made.
GUSA President Mike Meaney (SFS ’12) and Vice-President Greg Laverriere (COL ’12) deserve praise for restoring the program swiftly, while also heeding several critiques of the old readership program. Of equal importance, they also changed the distribution locations, offering the paper at Lau instead of at the Hariri building, where they went unread in previous years. Though pickup rates for last year were actually quite high (more than 70 percent for the Washington Post, and 82 percent for the New York Times) this location change will increase accessibility by making sure that newspapers aren’t being dispensed in remote areas. Anyone who has walked by the ICC, Lau, or Leavey recently can see that the entire supply of the Times is consistently gone by the late afternoon, as are most copies of the Post. This is as good proof as any of how much students value this program.
Also, GUSA is now reimbursed for newspapers that are never read. According to GUSA Senator Tyler Sax (COL ’13), every newspaper that is not picked up by the end of the day will be fully refunded. When the distribution crew comes by each morning they tally and then recycle untaken papers. This means Georgetown students aren’t paying for dozens of unread copies of USA Today, and they can be sure that those papers won’t be littering campus, either.
Though it is great to see the program back on campus, there is still room for more reform. GUSA should house all newspapers in a GOCard activated dispenser like the one used outside the ICC. This way, undergraduates can be sure that they are getting sole access to the newspapers their student activities fee money is paying for. GUSA should also look for committed long-term funding partners, so that students can know for certain that the program won’t be abruptly discontinued yet again.
Fundamentally, awareness and discussion of contemporary issues are crucial to creating a campus that fosters intellectual growth everywhere, not just in the classroom. When students have the opportunity to read the opinions and reporting of some of the world’s greatest journalists, they become better informed and better thinkers. And with the New York Times announcing that it will soon begin requiring paid subscriptions, the program couldn’t have returned at a better time. Few students are in the position to start paying for their own newspaper subscriptions. Thankfully, GUSA is picking up the tab for them.
No one reads newspapers